Crying in the Public Garden at 7:06 pm on a Tuesday
by Annie Wojnarowski
You’re sitting on a park bench, looking at the lesbian swan boats and blubbering uncontrollably. You don’t care, you see the bench as complete immunity from anyone seeing you, even though everyone hears you dry heaving in the cold Boston air. You’re crying so much that the squirrels won’t even come up to you. It’s that bad.
When you’re having a crying session in the Boston Public Garden, you never want to actually HEAR yourself crying. That’s why a prepared crying playlist needs to be created to fully submerge yourself into your self-pity.
But then the question begs: what makes a good crying playlist? I think the key is variety. Instrumentals, ballads, acoustic, and sometimes even fast-paced songs are all needed to make the most out of your emotional moment.
To start, it’s best to start with a song that lets you completely wallow uninhibited. You don’t want to stop yourself from crying, you need to flush it all out. I think “Both Sides Now” by Joni Mitchell is the perfect opener to a 15-20 minute sulk. Both beautiful as it is absolutely soul-crushing, Joni’s angelic voice matched with the guitar lets you remember that although immaculate songs like these exist, you are still allowed to be sad.
After a non-stop sob, there will probably be a moment of pause. A moment where there are still tears rolling down your face, but you are completely and utterly silent. I always like to queue up songs that have a story there, something with a lot of instruments that reminds you why you’re crying in the first place. This is where I usually press play on “Rejoice” by Julien Baker. Off her debut album, Sprained Ankle, Baker sings about her friends who have overdosed, and how she wishes, to God, that she went instead of them. Whenever I’m silently crying, staring at the ducks in the pond, and Baker screams: “Asking, why did you let them leave / And then make me stay?" I always end up back to square one, sobbing my entire body water content.
A perfect way to end to a cry session, essentially the time where you are starting to stand up, wipe the tears, and pretend the last half an hour hasn’t happened. You need a song that lets you have catharsis, but catharsis that doesn’t cause you to make a puddle of tears down Boylston Street. “Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl” by Broken Social Scene has the right amount of uplifting violin and banjo while still having the lyrics of someone having the worst post-breakup spiral.
Of course, everyone’s crying playlist is an incredibly personal thing to curate for yourself. However, I think this kind of formula will lead you in the right direction of what songs will help you to get the most out of your 30-minute crying window in America’s first public botanical garden.